NGC 2261 - Hubbles variable nebula - 10 inch reflector + Watec
Hubble's variable nebula was a bright fan shaped structure radiating from the star R Monocerotis a lot of structure was seen resulting in a very patching nebula consisting of the brighter parts around the illuminating star which slowly faded to the north. Because R Mon is a variable star the nebula also varies but at the time of observation R Mon was fainter than magnitude 10.5 but I estimate the size of the nebula about 4- 5'. A triangle of magnitude 14.0, 15.6 and 16.3 stars were just to the north of the nebula and a nice little cluster of magnitude 11- 16 stars just about 5' to the west.
NGC 2301 - 8.75 inch reflector
NGC 2301 was immediately obvious as a long chain of bright magnitude 8.5- 9.0 stars pretty sparse at its southern end but the stellar population increasing as you moved north through the cluster. The cluster was aligned roughly north- south, the bottom bright star at the southern end of the cluster looked orange in colour plus the bright star at the centre of the cluster was deep orange which looked quite lost in a swarm of faint white stars that surrounded it. The cluster filled the 23' field with around 60 stars going down to about magnitude 11.
NGC 2264 - the Christmas tree cluster - 8.75 inch reflector
This was a joy to observe, the field was filled with bright stars centred on the magnitude 4.6 star 15 Monocerotis located at the base of the cluster. The cluster has the alternative name of the Christmas tree cluster because of its long triangular shape does indeed look like the festive icon and the stars dotted within the cluster could almost be Christmas baubles though it's a shame that all the stars were white, a red star here and there would really make this a truly spectacular object. I counted about 50+ stars in the 25' diameter cluster and I did notice that there were some doubles at the northern part of the cluster near 15 Monocerotis itself. The whole cluster is filled with nebulosity but I didn't see any of this on this occasion plus the star at the top of the tree at the south end of cluster has the very challenging dark cone nebula but this was way beyond the sky conditions at the time of the observation.